A Most Unusual Goldfish
by SnubNosedSilhouette
Summary: "This," noted the Doctor as he charged ahead of River, cricket bat at the ready to defend a tank full of goldfish against all and sundry who might stand between them and the TARDIS, "is unquestionably one of the most absurd nights of my life."
1. A Most Unusual Goldfish

A/N:  
This fic is based off the hilarious snippet of the Doctor's nighttime adventures with River as seen in the mini-episode "Bad Night." If you haven't seen it yet (series 6 DVD extras) do so immediately. What follows will make very little sense without that context.

Also, this is my first foray into really plotty fic as opposed to character studies and vignettes. It was more of a challenge than I'd originally anticipated, and I'd greatly appreciate feedback about how well (or not) it works.

Cheers!

* * *

**Prologue**

"Right then, we're off to bed," Rory called from the main level of the control room. The Doctor could hear his footsteps on the stairway, which, most days, unless the TARDIS was feeling cross, led to their bedroom. Two weeks ago she'd relocated it to the spot normally reserved for the least-convenient broom cupboard after Amy had complained that the new swimming pool wasn't nearly as impressive as the previous one.

"Goodnight, Doctor," Amy said, sticking her head over the ledge and doing her best to sound completely casual. As he had been for the last several hours, the Doctor was bent nearly double in the swing, head buried deep in the time rotor's innards. He hadn't said a word since he'd gone down there two hours ago, which would have been perfectly normal for a regular person, but this kind of quiet industry was so incredibly unusual for the Doctor that she'd swiped the portable scanner from the sickbay just to make sure he wasn't suffering from some kind of alien silence virus or something.

What she hadn't counted on, of course, was the sound the scanner made when she waved it in the Doctor's direction.

"Hmmm? Oh, yes, goodnight Amy. Wait – what are you doing with that?" The Doctor pulled his head out of the tangle of wires and cables.

"Me? Nothing." Amy tucked the scanner on the floor next to her torso, only belatedly remembering that the floor was glass and thus, everything on it was completely visible to the Doctor.

"Were you scanning me?" He sounded more amused than irritated, and at least she'd established that he could still talk. "Can you even read that thing?"

"Um, yes? And no, probably not. Rory can, though." The Doctor pushed his goggles up over his forehead and gave her a quizzical expression. "It's just you hadn't said anything in hours, even when we asked you if you'd like some biscuits."

"Really, I'm touched." He smiled fondly at her, though it didn't reach his eyes. Something was on his mind, something he wasn't sharing. She'd known that much for weeks. Even knowing that he hadn't fallen victim to a tongue-tying disease suddenly wasn't as reassuring as she'd thought it would be. The question she'd been wanting to ask him died on her lips. Now was clearly not the time for deep conversation.

"Well, guess I'll be on my way, then. To bed. With Rory." Amy waved her hand goodnight at him, feeling like a total idiot, and he halfheartedly waved back before pulling the goggles down over his eyes again and turning back to the bit of cabling in his hand.

Yes, something was definitely wrong with the Doctor. Her question could wait awhile longer, but she'd have whatever this was out of him soon even if she had to play keep away with his sonic screwdriver.

Lost in her thoughts, Amy didn't hear the Doctor gently set down the cable on the floor grating beneath him, or hear him rise from the swing as she passed over his head on the stairway.

_Finally_, he thought as he heard her clatter down the hallway.

**Chapter One: A Most Unusual Goldfish**

At first, he hadn't even done it consciously.

Months ago, Amy and Rory had, as usual, retired to their room in the evening (or what passed for evening on the TARDIS—establishing a time of day when one existed outside of time itself had always proved a bit tricky for his companions). and the TARDIS hadn't needed any repairs. He hadn't been in the middle of a good book, nor had he felt a pressing need for a swim.

Ergo, adventure!

He could hardly be blamed for showing up at Feldor VII just in time to run headlong into River Song, who was in the middle of stealing a rather important artifact from the archives of a wealthy collector. Several hours, two heated exchanges of innuendo-filled banter, and one glorious dash through a dark forest later, they had arrived back to the TARDIS. He had invited her in, she had declined on the grounds that she really didn't want to wake Amy and Rory (unlikely, he had assured her, as they were quite sound sleepers), and then he had found himself pinned against the TARDIS doors. The fact that he had returned her kiss rather than flailing about like a moth attempting to escape from the lure of a flame was hardly relevant.

As he'd said, running into River that night hadn't exactly been a conscious effort. But then it had happened again the next night he'd been at loose ends and in need of some activity. And the next. Before long, he'd realized that the old girl was purposely throwing them together, though to what end he still had no idea. Still, adventuring with River was unquestionably exciting, and if it involved more…physically stimulating…interludes than he typically shared with anyone, well, it was a price he was willing to pay, though not one whose implications he chose to spend much time thinking about.

At some point he had decided to start dressing a bit more formally for these overnight outings. Somehow, an inordinate number of them happened to take place at parties. Nothing too outlandish, mind, just swapping the tweed for a dinner jacket, then the boots for some wing tips, and finally testing the waters during an excursion to Victorian London with tails and (what he considered) a smashing top hat. To his surprise, River did not shoot the hat, which was why he kept the outfit on regular rotation, though only at night. Amy and Rory's night. Because, while he and River had never actually said a word about it, Amy and Rory were not invited. To be sure, River enjoyed the company of his companions, but he was fairly certain that she would have objected if he had to shown up one evening with them in tow. She might even have dropped the word "date" into the conversation, and that was a word he had tried very hard to avoid affixing to these whatever-they-weres.

Besides which, Amy would never have let him hear the end of it.

On this particular night he was planning a short jaunt to Aleph IV. The Treaty of Mandellum, which established formal diplomatic and trade ties between Starship UK and the Alephian Nation-State was due to be signed, and he had an inkling that it was exactly the right spot for some sightseeing. Otherwise unremarkable, the signing ceremony was notable for occurring just as the primary star for the Denais System was going supernova. While the Doctor had been present for the deaths of more stars than he could count (well, actually he could have counted them quite easily, but as a general rule he preferred not to reflect on all of those occasions) the view of this one from the ceremony site had reportedly been particularly striking. And he had an inkling that River might just show up too. Not that he was counting on her appearance, really. In fact, he wasn't even going to look for her. It was purely in an effort to blend in with the formality of the occasion that he had detoured to the Wardrobe from the Control Room, and that he was once again donning his top hat. River Song had nothing to do with anything he decided or did not decide to do. Really.

Straightening his bowtie and running a hand through his hair for the last time, the Doctor briefly glanced back at the stairs, reassuring himself that Amy and Rory were well and truly asleep. Amy, in particular, would never let him hear the end of it if she saw him going out in the middle of (her) night, much less dressed as he was. The stairs were empty, and a thrill (which had nothing at all to do with River Song, and everything to do with the impending sight of a truly spectacular supernova, naturally) ran through him as he checked his breast pocket one last time for the sonic before pushing through the TARDIS doors.

"Hello, Sweetie" greeted him as soon as he set foot outside his ship.

River Song, dressed as usual for the occasion (one of these days he was really going to have to investigate the storage capabilities of her tiny cell in Stormcage. The woman never wore the same thing twice, from what he could tell) was pointedly tapping her foot as she watched him exit. Clearly, he was either quite late or she just liked putting him off-balance. Personally, he had taken to assuming the latter ever since she had inadvertently revealed that she enjoyed seeing him flustered a few weeks back. Seeing as how that incident was still in her future, he knew that she didn't know that he knew what she was doing…and games of timey-wimey one-upsmanship really were his favorite.

"River," he began, hoping he sounded nonchalant in spite of the sensation of small frogs leaping about in the region of his stomach. "And to what do I owe the pleasure?"

She smiled her secretive wouldn't-you-love-to-know smile. "Sightseeing, naturally," before giving him a long head-to-toe look that simultaneously implied that the sights she had in mind were not limited to astronomical events, and that she knew exactly what he looked like under his layers of clothing. He hated that look.

"The supernova, I presume," he said, steadfastly ignoring her blatant ogling. Best thing, really.

"You know what they say about assumptions," she purred.

He knew, on some level, that there would likely come a day when River Song's flirting didn't unnerve him. Seeing as how that day hadn't yet come, while he no longer found himself rendered speechless at her comments, he had decided that confronting innuendo with innuendo was the best way to stay ahead of (or at least keep pace with) the game they played.

"No, care to fill me in?" he raised an eyebrow suggestively.

"I'm afraid we don't have time at the moment," she said, "but perhaps later…" and she took his arm in her own, turning them both away from the direction he'd planned to walk.

"Ah, River – I believe the signing ceremony is the other direction," he chided gently, turning them back in his original direction. He did so love to be the one who knew more than she did, even if his knowledge was limited to architectural plans.

"Yes, Sweetie, but the signing ceremony isn't where the fun is tonight," she countered, turning them back to face her intended half of the corridor. "It's over, by the by – that room is full of stuffy bureaucrats and hangers-on eating canapés at the moment. The _real_ action is in the parcel room."

"The…parcel room?" he asked, completely flummoxed. "What could possibly be happening in the parcel room? Other than, of course, parcels being received and sorted. Rather dull things, parcels. Unless they're for me, of course, in which case I find them delightful. Wait, River!" with an annoyed huff she had disengaged her arm as soon as he'd started to digress, and was now several yards away, striding confidently in her chosen direction. He had no choice but to jog in order to catch up with her.

"Yes, Sweetie, the parcel room. Trust me." she smiled another maddening I-know-things-you-don't-know-I-know smile.

He hated that smile.

Several minutes, two corridors, and one very brief lift ride later, they arrived in the building's basement. Basements, the Doctor reflected, essentially looked the same no matter where or when you were. Dim, at least slightly neglected, occasionally quite creepy, and much quieter than aboveground floors. This one appeared to be one of the least interesting he'd ever had the displeasure of visiting, and he was on the verge of suggesting that River had perhaps been mistaken in her assertion that anything interesting could possibly _ever_ happen here, when he heard a terrified shriek coming from behind a door clearly marked "Parcel Room."

"Told you so," River smirked before pulling an impossibly tiny gun out of her cleavage and hurrying over to the door.

"_River_" he hissed. "You can't just rush in there!" Too late, because she'd already flung it open.

Inside, they were confronted with a young woman, apparently the clerk, who had just uncovered a rather alarming bomb-like apparatus from behind a pile of boxes clearly labeled "Diplomatic Conference." Her scream had apparently resulted from the fact that there was less than a minute remaining on the bomb's timer.

"Get rid of it!" the attendant shrieked at River and the Doctor, clearly under the impression that they were there to help her. Which, in fact, they were, but the Doctor had never really appreciated being yelled at by strangers.

"Yes, yes, all in good time," River muttered, bending over the device with remarkable aplomb.

_She really does that so well_, the Doctor thought, before mentally checking himself. Even he wasn't sure at the moment if he'd meant that River was superb at staying calm even in alarming situations, or that she looked particularly attractive from behind when she bent over. _Focus,_ he chastised himself before pulling out his sonic and running it over the bomb.

"Well, it doesn't have any lethal explosives inside," he informed River, who was looking for the wire that would disable the bomb. There was always a wire.

"It doesn't?" she asked, still focusing on disabling the device. "What does it have inside, then?"

"I'm not quite sure," he said, scanning it again. "It's some kind of biological material, but it looks to be in a state of flux. The DNA sequence is unstable - it's reshuffling itself to mimic whichever life forms are in the vicinity-"

"Meaning it's not your typical biological weapon," River finished for him before she pulled a white wire. The device, which had been audibly powering up as they worked, immediately silenced as the timer stopped. "Well, whatever it is, it's neutralized now." River straightened up again while the Doctor continued to crouch over the bomb, inspecting it visually. The casing was fairly unremarkable for this century – any one of twenty dozen races could have easily located and assembled it, including both the humans of Starship UK and the Alephians.

"We can take it back to the TARDIS for more thorough tests later," he noted, glancing at his wristwatch. It wasn't that he minded the adventure, but he had been so looking forward to that brilliant first flare of the supernova.

"You there," River pointed at the attendant, who was still shaking and cowering in a corner behind some shelving units. "Who delivered these packages?"

"I…is that thing really turned off?" she asked, clearly terrified to come out of her (completely useless in the face of a powerful explosive) hiding place.

"It is," the Doctor said, straightening himself. He was so much better at soothing people than River, really. She tended to frighten them off what with her guns and her hair and her interrogate-first-act-like-a-reasonable-person-later manner. "Hello. I'm the Doctor and this is River. You are?"

"Lexa Lareso," she said, with a nervous smile. "You're really sure? It's not just playing dead or something?"

"Really sure," and he gave her his most reassuring smile. "Can you tell us who brought this pile in earlier?"

Lexa glanced nervously between him and River. "I should really call Security now. This place is swarming with guards, and I'll be in a lot of trouble if theythink I didn't let them know right away about a threat to the delegations."

"Of course," River said, taking a step towards Lexa. "We're actually with the security team, though, so you really needn't worry about that. Doctor, our credentials-" She elbowed him in the ribs when he didn't immediately produce his psychic paper. Taking the bruising hint, he whipped his billfold out of his jacket pocket, letting Lexa get a good look at the paper.

"Thank goodness!" she said, clearly feeling far more at ease now that she thought they were affiliated with the conference rather than just random passers-by who happened to know how to disarm bombs. "I don't really know who brought them here, though. I just came on shift an hour ago, and they were already here. Velux - he works the day shift - must have received them."

"Why didn't they go straight up to the conference rooms if they're for tonight's event?" River asked, which was really quite a good question in the Doctor's opinion. He rather wondered why he hadn't thought of it.

"I…I don't know. Velux would have called the staff as soon as they arrived to arrange for transportation to wherever they were needed. If they're still here, either he couldn't get ahold of anyone who could tell him where they were needed, or he could but they said that they didn't require them until later." Lexa wrung her hands together. "Who could _do_ such a thing? I could have _died!_"

The Doctor didn't see how reminding the girl that the bomb hadn't actually contained any lethal weapon he could identify as such would be terribly helpful at the moment. She clearly wasn't very bright.

"Is there a delivery log we could see?" River asked, ignoring Lexa's pending meltdown.

"Oh! Yes! Right there – next to the door." she pointed at an electronic clipboard. River took it off the wall and glanced through the most recent entries, quickly comparing them to the labels on the packages next to the bomb.

"Here," she said, pointing at an entry. "Looks like it was delivered four hours ago. Whoever sent it must have assumed that would be enough time for the lot to be delivered before the bomb would explode."

"Yes, but what was it supposed to do?" the Doctor asked, mostly rhetorically. "And more to the point, these are addressed to the Alephian delegation – who would be targeting them here?" The Doctor's eyes flew back to the log. "There are twenty boxes listed here, but I only see thirteen in that pile." His eyes fixed on Lexa, "Where are the other seven?"

Lexa stepped out from behind the cabinets and looked over the log. At least she had stopped shaking, though the Doctor had no doubt she was still on the verge of a panic attack. "Those were delivered. I remember, just as I came on shift, someone from the events staff came down to pick them up."

"Quickly," he said, "Where did they take them?"

Lexa tapped the log until a new screen popped up. "It looks like they were delivered to the Starship UK senior diplomatic holding room." Her eyes widened, and she choked out, "the _queen_ would have been there!"

* * *

As it turned out, River's command that "Nobody move!" when she and the Doctor entered the diplomatic chamber was entirely unnecessary. This was mostly due to the fact that the room's lone occupant was presently physically incapable of _not_ moving, as she appeared to have been turned into rather large goldfish and was flopping about on the floor, desperate for water.

The Doctor shrieked and scooped up the fish, dropping her into a decorative fish pond which happened to be conveniently located in the center of the room. As he scooped, he noted that the nearly deceased (and presumably originally human) fish was joining at least a dozen other identical fish in the pond. _Sorting that out later_, a voice in the back of his brain noted.

"I think we've figured out what that biological matter in the other bomb was supposed to do," River said drily as the Doctor threw the final fish into the pond. "_Now_ what?"

"Now we try to determine who this fish actually was—is" he corrected himself, "and then who sent those bombs. Or vice-versa. I assume the former will be easier than the latter, but really at this point it could happen the other way 'round. Or we could learn both together" he trailed off, recognizing River's that's-nice-but-I'm-losing-interest look.

Before either of them had a chance to begin their next verbal sparring match, the door opened.

"What the devil are _you_ doing here?" a thin, unpleasant looking man demanded.

* * *

"Well, how was I supposed to know that the Prince of Wales was going to just waltz into the room and demand to know what had happened to his mother?" River snapped, walking briskly ahead of the Doctor and gesturing wildly with the hand that also happened to be holding onto the second, unexploded bomb.

"Well frankly, your excuse that we were the cleaning crew's advance team was hardly convincing, dear," he retorted, hurrying to catch up with her.

"Yes, and your comment that we were there to ensure that the fish weren't suffering from any undue stress was hardly helpful, Sweetie," she said tartly before stopping in her tracks. "And just what do you plan to do about Her Aquatic Majesty, anyway?"

"As I've been _trying_ to tell you, we're taking the other bomb back to the TARDIS for some scans, provided that you don't manage to detonate it en route," he snapped back, feeling particularly irritated. "Once we know what exactly caused the transformation we should have a better idea of how to reverse it." Honestly, couldn't she just _listen_ for once? He swore he'd never met anyone who listened to him less than River Song.

"Oh, I need to pay more attention to you, do I?" she retorted, turning around to fully face him for the first time since they had been caught flat-footed by the future King of England. "Well why don't you just-"

Without thinking, the Doctor closed the distance between them with one stride, took River's shoulder in her hand, and pushed her against the corridor wall. Before he could even form a coherent thought, his lips were on hers.

This was no leisurely kiss, nor was it full of the bewilderment and wonder of the first time his lips had touched hers (from his perspective) just weeks ago after their journey to Florida in 1969. No, this kiss was a battle, and as his hands found purchase against her hips, he felt the stirrings of true physical desire for River Song fluttering deep in his gut. In the deepest, most secret part of his hearts – the part he spent an increasing amount of time trying to ignore these days – he acknowledged that he'd been wanting to do this since he'd first seen her standing outside the TARDIS doors an hour ago.

"You were saying?" he finally asked, ending the kiss (reluctantly) exactly three minutes after it had begin, and two minutes forty three seconds after she had relaxed into his embrace and begun kissing him back in earnest.

"I was saying that you were impossible and arrogant," she replied crisply, though with a fond smile on her lips rather than a cross smirk.

Oh, how he adored that look.

"You love it when I'm impossible," he reminded her, and reached for the bomb she still held in her left hand. "May I?"

She passed him the device without argument and pressed her lips against his one last time before pushing back from the wall. "We aren't going to the TARDIS yet, by the way."

* * *

"_What _is the meaning of this?" demanded the Alephian ambassador.

"You heard me perfectly well the first time," River said calmly. Too calmly. The Doctor knew that tone of voice – had been on the receiving end of it more than once – and it was not good. Very not good. The calmer River sounded in a tense situation, the more likely she was to shoot someone in short order.

And here he'd thought tonight was going to be relaxing.

"You are accusing _me_ and _my_ delegation of…of…planting biological weapons at this conference?" The man had now puffed up to twice his original size (Alephians were known to do that. Bit intimidating, really, but one wouldn't know it to look at River's reaction to him) and was turning the most interesting shade of purple.

"I most certainly am," River responded crisply. "Doctor, the bomb, if you please."

Wordlessly, the Doctor handed the device over. He really had no idea where River was going with this, only that she was very certain that she was right. As a general rule she did tend to be right about these sorts of things, but it was still making him nervous that she hadn't yet shared her insights into the bomb's origins with him.

He very much hoped she'd actually had an insight and that this wasn't just a gigantic game of chicken with a likely suspect.

"You see, Ambassador, this device isn't remarkable in the slightest. It's generic almost to the point of absurdity, particularly when one considers how many far superior weapons there are out there which could achieve the same effect. Of course, most of those are also far more easily identifiable as well." River turned the bomb around in her hand, encouraging the Alephian to study it carefully.

"If it is so common," he began, filling every word with venom, "then _how_, pray tell, could you assume that it came from us?"

"Simple, really," said River lightly, tapping at the side of the timer with one red fingernail. "Biological weapons capable of turning one species into another are unique to four star systems: Risos, Calfaxtria, Helnor, and Asonos."

"None of those systems are anywhere near Aleph!" roared the warrior chief, who thus far had remained silent but fuming at the ambassador's side. "Do you require a map, Dr. Song?"

And suddenly, it clicked. Oh, she was _good_.

"No, but you might be interested to know that this particular substance hasn't been manufactured on Risos for, oh, around 80 years, which means nothing created there would still be viable after so long. It is still in production on Calfaxtria, but is heavily regulated against offworld export. You could easily procure some on Asonos, but given the fact that Asonos has a methane atmosphere which is highly toxic to most sentient forms of life in this galaxy, it's improbable that anyone would choose to procure this device there. Helnor, on the other hand, manufactures both the bio-matter and this particular casing _and_ engages in arms trade with your planet." The Doctor gave what he considered to be his most charming smile to the warrior chief.

"Our trade agreements with Helnor are irrelevant," the chief spat out. "Besides, if this device came from _Helnor_, then why are you not accusing _them_ of planting it here? Or have you forgotten that the bomb you carry was intended for the Alephian delegation?"

"Oh no, we've not forgotten that point," he said, catching River's eye as he plucked the device in question out of her hand. "Not at all. In fact, I was just about to congratulate you on your truly excellent plan to throw us off the track. Well, I say _us_, but really we weren't here to do anything more than see the truly spectacular supernova that is due to appear in, oh," he checked his wristwatch, "seventeen minutes. Pity. I imagine we'll miss the best part unless you decide to just confess and allow yourself to be taken into custody now."

If he was being perfectly honest (and really, Rule One) he would have conceded that it was a guess. A likely guess, a probable guess, an educated guess, but a guess nonetheless. For someone determined enough, no toxic atmosphere or trade restrictions would prevent the acquisition of a weapon. And it wasn't completely outside the realm of possibility that someone from Helnor could have planted the devices. But the warrior chief had started to deflate the moment the Doctor had begun to tick off all the reasons why Helnor was an obvious point of purchase if the Alephians were behind the plot. He had recovered quickly, but not before the Doctor (and River, he assumed) had noticed exactly what was happening. _That's the thing about being able to increase your size through respiration, _the Doctor mused somewhere in the back of his brain while his mouth kept talking, _if you're not very careful about your breathing, lying is nearly impossible_.

"Yes, about the bomb intended for your people that was mistakenly left in the parcel room," River picked up, taking it from the Doctor's hand again as she circled around the ambassador. "Someone from the Alephian delegation intentionally didn't retrieve it when it arrived earlier today. I can only assume," she continued, catching the Doctor's eye and giving him a knowing smirk, "that the plan was to make it look like both delegations were targeted without ever actually endangering your people."

"You have no proof of any of this!" the ambassador roared. "And for that matter, how do we know you didn't plant these things yourselves? You don't seem to be associated with anyone here, and showed up just as the bombs did!"

"Not a bad bit of deductive reasoning there," the Doctor nodded, accepting the bomb back from River. "Problem is, we know we didn't plant these, and there's one last piece of evidence proving that someone from your side did."

"Which is?" the warrior chief demanded.

"This timer," River explained, tapping it once again. "It's designed to fall completely to pieces – to be incinerated, actually – when the bomb explodes. _It_ only comes from one world. Yours. Oh, and there's also the matter of your public statements prior to this conference that an armed conflict between Starship UK and Helnor would be far more beneficial to Aleph IV than any trade agreement. Of course, you don't have the support of your government to actually act on those sentiments, so instead you're trying to provoke the English into starting a war for you."

The Doctor felt just as surprised as the Alephians looked at this particular revelation. He'd been planning to keep bluffing until someone confessed. In fairness, it did usually work.

With a roar, the warrior chief grabbed for the bomb. River, usually quite quick on her feet, attempted to leap sideways to avoid his grasp, but tripped on the hem of her dress instead. She managed to toss the bomb in the Doctor's direction, but the shot went wild and the device flew several inches higher than he could reach. It flew, oddly enough, in a perfect arc right into the arms of the warrior chief, who gave the Doctor a wild grin before he turned and ran out of the room with the bomb.

"Wait!" River shouted to him as he began to follow the Alephian, whose delegation had remained, stunned, behind. "Don't follow him!"

"River, without the bio-matter inside that bomb we can't use the TARDIS medbay to formulate an antidote!"

"We don't need the bomb for that," she waved her hand dismissively as she brushed nonexistent dirt from the skirt of her long dress. Suddenly, the Doctor became very suspicious.

"River, what did you do to it?"

Meeting his eye for the first time since her supposedly accidental fall, River smiled sweetly. The sound of an explosion from the corridor outside negated the need for a response.

"_River!"_

* * *

"Really, Sweetie, I think we should count this as a positive development," River said, one hand carefully cupped over the edge of the rolled newspaper her target had chosen to land on. "After all, at least there was a fly in that portion of the corridor. Think how difficult it would have been to find him if the largest form of life within four meters had been bacterial."

The Doctor was not amused.

"Positive? Postive, River? What exactly is _positive_ about the fact that we still have no idea how to turn either Her Majesty or Scourge-of-Millions there back into themselves, and thanks to your tinkering we have nothing left to test in order to find a solution to that problem?" He was furious, and probably could have gone on much longer if they hadn't been running.

"What's positive is that we have a very valuable bargaining chip," she answered, rounding the corner ahead of him. She paused to fish her TARDIS key from her cleavage using the hand that wasn't presently occupied with keeping one very valuable insect safe. He _really_ didn't want to know what else she might have hidden there. "We have their warrior chief, and we have evidence to prove that he, and possibly their ambassador as well, attempted to sabotage this conference in a decidedly underhanded and dishonorable fashion. If nothing else, Sweetie," she continued, pushing through the doors, "we have _leverage_."

"You're assuming that the ambassador knows what was in those things and that he knows how to reverse the effects. And you do know what they say about assumptions," he countered.

"Yes, but we really don't have time at the moment, Sweetie," she countered, pressing herself against him briefly as she set the rolled-up paper on top of his answering machine.

He was fairly sure she'd done it just to see if he would squirm.

"Now, first things first. We need to retrieve Her Majesty from that pond." River stepped away from the console, all business again. "Wait, where are Amy and Rory?"

"Sleeping. Hopefully until this is over," he said grimly, imagining exactly how much worse the situation would become if Amy were to stumble into it. "We don't need their help."

"Agreed."

"That does give me an idea, though," he said. "Hang on a tick," and secretly loving the very confused look on River's face at his cryptic remark, he dashed out of the Control Room.

* * *

"You look ridiculous," River told him, but the fond smirk on her face told him that she loved it.

"Rule number 105 – walk softly and carry a big stick," he answered, enjoying the weight of the cricket bat in his hand.

"So you're plagiarizing rules from Teddy Roosevelt now, are you?" she asked, a broad grin replacing the smirk. "Really, Sweetie, this," pointing at the gun she was once again wielding, "is much less…obtrusive."

"And much more likely to inflict permanent damage," he insisted. "No, if we're going to be assaulted by any one of the several dozen security personnel who are likely searching for us at this very moment, I'd rather not cause serious injury."

"Sweetie? I do hate to break it to you, but that thing," she pointed at the bat, "could very easily do just that."

"Tell that to Amy," he muttered darkly, wincing at the memory of the truly spectacular headache he'd suffered from for hours after his first encounter with the adult version of his current companion.

River gave him a quizzical look, but before she could ask the obvious question they were rudely seized from behind by several large men wearing security uniforms.

"Gentlemen," said the Doctor, assuming his best trust-me-I'm-the-Doctor face. "We're in rather desperate need of a conversation with the Prince of Wales."

* * *

"My mother has been…kidnapped?" the prince asked for the third time.

"Not so much kidnapped as abducted for her personal protection," said the Doctor, glancing anxiously behind the prince to try to make out how many fish were still in the koi pond. When they'd entered, the prince had mentioned that the lot were on loan from a nearby animal supplier and would be returned there within the hour.

"We assume you heard about the bomb that was planted in this suite, and that the Alephians may have been behind both it and another device," River said.

"My security detail did fill me in about it, yes," said the prince. "I trust you understand how delicate our situation is given the fact that we just signed the trade agreement with them two hours ago."

"Of course," said the Doctor. "Which is why your mother is best kept in our custody for the time being."

"You understand that it's difficult for me to simply accept this without speaking with her," the prince said flatly. "I cannot understand why she isn't able to at least tell me about this herself over the comm system."

"Forgive me, your Highness," River interjected, "but the comm system can be traced. If your mother is being targeted, we can't take the chance that the Alephians aren't monitoring it. I know this is difficult, but you need to trust that we are keeping her safe."

The Doctor had to hand it to her, River could be sincerely convincing when she wanted to be. Pity she was lying through her teeth.

"If it makes you feel better," the Doctor cut in, deciding that it was only way the prince was going to leave the room so they could retrieve his mother from the pond, "here's my number." Pulling a pen from his jacket pocket, the Doctor scribbled the TARDIS's number onto the back of the prince's hand. "Call me if there's an emergency."

The prince, startled by the Doctor's familiarity and his unexpectedly dirty hand, simply nodded in agreement. "I will," he choked out.

"Right then," the Doctor capped his pen and turned his attention to the fish pond. "We need to…investigate the room. If you wouldn't mind, your Highness, I must insist that you wait elsewhere so as to reduce the chance of contaminating the crime scene."

"The – yes, of course," the prince agreed. "And I will be calling you, Doctor, if my mother isn't back extremely soon. You can be sure of that."

"Yes, yes, of course," the Doctor agreed as the prince stepped out of the room. "We'll be in touch."

River closed the doors as the prince and his entourage departed. "I thought he'd never leave. Now, which one is the Queen?"

They both peered into the pond. Fourteen fish were lazily swimming inside, all roughly the same color and size. "I don't suppose you noticed any specific markings on Her Royal Highness before you threw her in there earlier, Doctor?" River asked, crouching down to observe the fish more closely.

"Naturally," the Doctor said, pulling a small glass bowl out of his jacket pocket.

"Showoff," River teased, gesturing to his clearly bigger-on-the-inside pockets.

"You love it," he returned with a grin. "Now, there was a white spot around two centimeters wide below her left fin, and a jigsaw puzzle shaped tan spot on her tail."

Scanning the fish, the Doctor took a moment to appreciate River's hair out of the corner of his eye. Running, he decided, made it even more attractive than usual. Later he was going to avail himself of the first opportunity to lose his hands in it. After they dealt with the fish situation.

"There!" River pointed to a fish at the far end of the pond. "Is that her?"

The Doctor squinted, "Yes, I think it is."

Without further discussion, River took the bowl from his hand, slid out of her heels, and waded into the water. "Got her!"

"Now to take her back to the TARDIS," the Doctor agreed, giving River a hand out of the pond. "We just need to contact the Alephian ambassador, arrange to receive the antidote for the queen in exchange for his warrior chief, and get Her Majesty back here before the prince decides he's had enough of the silent treatment. What could possibly go wrong?"

* * *

"The phrase 'famous last words' really doesn't quite cut it, does it, Sweetie?" River asked breathlessly as she and the Doctor dashed down the corridor. Again.

"If Amy had simply seen fit to stay asleep like a normal human being we wouldn't be in this predicament," he retorted angrily.

"If you hadn't picked the wrong fish, we might not be in it either," she replied sharply, clearly offended on Amy's behalf.

"Fine, take her side," he answered, choosing to take the high road. "Right now I'm more concerned with retrieving the actual queen and figuring out what to do about the fact that _Amy_ took it upon herself to kill the Alephian warrior chief with the newspaper _you _left sitting around on the console than assigning blame." He stopped at the door to the royal suite, and considered the fact that he held the door open for River to be both gentlemanly and diplomatic. The withering glare she shot him as she walked through suggested that she felt otherwise.

"Oh, thank goodness," he breathed as he saw that the fish, though no longer in the pond, had been left in a large tank on top of a rather convenient pushcart.

"We're taking the lot of them this time," River informed him, seizing the cart. "Run!"

_This,_ thought the Doctor as he charged ahead of River, cricket bat at the ready to defend a tank full of goldfish against all and sundry who might stand between them and the TARDIS, _is unquestionably one of the most absurd nights of my life_.

* * *

"So you see, Ambassador," the Doctor concluded, "unless you hand over the antidote to me immediately, I am fully prepared to release the recording I just showed you to the Starship UK representatives. As much as you and your tragically deceased warrior chief wanted to start a war, I feel fairly confident that your methodology would not be received well back home. And let me assure you, the Prince would have no qualms about making this situation very, very public."

The ambassador said nothing for a moment. He gave the Doctor a long, hard stare, and then glanced up and down at River, his eyes finally coming to rest on the data chip she held delicately between her left forefinger and thumb. Her right hand was otherwise occupied by her ever-present pistol.

"We have backup copies, of course," River assured him. "This is more for show than anything else."

The Doctor held his breath as the ambassador began to inflate himself again – there would be more running straight back to the TARDIS if he decided to fight. Then, just as suddenly as it started, the air went out of the Alephian as if he were a balloon that had suddenly sprung a leak. Wordlessly, he pulled a vial of bio-matter from his pocket.

"The antidote?" the Doctor asked, taking the sample.

The ambassador nodded. "I trust that all copies of that recording will be destroyed," he said, sounding far less impressive than he doubtless intended.

"All but one," the Doctor agreed. "I will retain the original just in case anything…untoward…were to occur to spark conflict between your people and the Starship UK." River nodded approvingly at this comment.

The ambassador opened his mouth again, reconsidered, and closed it. "Then I shall bid you farewell, Doctor."

"Ah, Ambassador," River said, holding out the rolled-up paper she had retrieved from the TARDIS console. "Your warrior chief?"

The ambassador accepted the paper with a disdainful sneer on his face. "His body will be…disposed of," he said before turning again and leaving the room with as much dignity as he could muster.

River and the Doctor exchanged a look of relief and amusement at the somewhat anticlimactic resolution to this truly unusual situation. "We should probably get Her Majesty sorted before her son starts calling for our heads," River noted, taking the Doctor's hand in her own.

"Indeed," he said, turning to face her as his hand acted on his earlier impulse and rose almost of its own accord to thread itself through her hair. "I'm sure Security will be here at any moment demanding to know where we're keeping her."

"Mmmm," River agreed, her hand tightening around his waist. "They'll probably want to confiscate that cricket bat of yours."

The Doctor smiled as he lowered his mouth to hers. "And here I thought you'd insist on doing the honors yourself."

They didn't make it back to the TARDIS for a disgracefully long time.

* * *

"See, this is a much better way to view a supernova," River informed the Doctor smugly, leaning against him as they dangled their legs out the open doors of the TARDIS. "What possessed you to go down to the planet to watch it?"

There were a number of ways the Doctor could have responded to this question, _I wanted to see you _was on the tip of his tongue. "I have always had a deep and abiding interest in trade agreements," came out instead, as primly as if he had been talking to a minor acquaintance rather than…whatever River was. Her glare plainly showed that she didn't believe him, but she didn't press the point.

"Speaking of which, what exactly were _you_ doing there, Dr. Song? You certainly seemed to have more than an inkling about what was going on before I arrived." He shifted slightly to look her in the eye. Not that he really expected her to fabricate a story about such a trivial detail, but it _was_ River, after all.

"Got a tip from another inmate at Stormcage and was feeling restless, that's all," she smiled sincerely, and the Doctor knew she was lying.

"In other words," he said, "spoilers."

Her smile broadened into a genuine grin. "Spoilers indeed."

An easy silence settled between them as they watched the star begin the process of flaring out of existence. The Doctor listened to the steady rise and fall of her breath, enjoying the weight of her against his side, and found that his own breathing had suddenly become a bit less regular.

For all of their increasingly easy and familiar banter, and for all of the kisses (even the ones he initiated himself) they had shared, _this_, just sitting next to her enjoying the twin sights of a dying star and the way her eyes caught its reflected light was enough to leave him breathless. This moment, or one like it, was what he had been hoping for when he'd first stepped out of the TARDIS hours ago, and he knew it was the scene he would play over and over again in his head after she was gone.

And then it hit him – for all he had been telling himself that he most certainly wasn't spending his time thinking about this _thing_ between himself and River, he was doing just that, and doing quite a bit of it.


	2. The Euphamistic Euphonium

**A/N:** This is Chapter 2 of my loosely connected "Night and the Doctor" series based off the mini-episodes produced for the DVDs of Season 6. Go see them if you haven't already because they're brilliant. This chapter centers around the events of "Good Night," and falls somewhere between "Day of the Moon" and "The Doctor's Wife." It also contains very small spoilers for the Season 6 Christmas special.

* * *

**Ch. 1.5**

Amy gave the Doctor a tired smile from across the Control Room. "Long day," she said by way of an explanation when he raised an eyebrow.

"Indeed," he remarked, choosing not to comment on the fact that it would have been a much, much shorter day if she and Rory hadn't chosen to engage in…behavior…at the exact moment they should have been running for their lives from an angry mob. He much preferred living in a universe where he could pretend that his companions simply slept in their separate bunk beds every night and never, ever chose to exercise certain marital privileges in the middle of adventures to alien worlds.

Really.

"Speaking of long days," Amy continued, characteristically not having the sense to look abashed, "we haven't seen River in quite awhile."

"In what way is that 'speaking of long days?'" he asked, startled by the ease with which she had turned the conversation away from her own romantic behavior to (what she clearly believed to be, though to his knowledge had never directly observed—he'd been very careful about that) his own.

"Only that we've been having long days more often than not lately, and long days for us mean less time at night for you to run out to parties with River." Now it was Amy's turn to raise an eyebrow.

"How many times do I have to tell you that I do _not_ spend my nights with River Song?" he asked, irritation bubbling into his voice.

"Rule one, Doctor. Rule one." And with that infuriating (and completely true) comment, Amy walked up the stairs and out of sight.

Damn her.

* * *

**The Euphemistic Euphonium**

"So I was thinking just now," he began, stepping out of the TARDIS and directly into the corridor in front of Cell 46 at Stormcage Containment Facility. "It's been awhile since I last went to a concert, and there was a truly smashing performance of Mahler's Eighth Symphony on Luna Base in 2343. But who wants to go to the symphony alone, because really, which I why I decided-"

"That you'd pop by and see if I was available?" she asked stepping out of her cell (how did she _do_ that? He'd never seen her pick a single lock, and he was fairly certain the guards regularly checked the security of her cell given her penchant for escaping) already dressed as formally as he in a long, slinky black dress tastefully dotted with crystals.

"Something like that, yes," he said, trying not to sound surprised that she'd not only anticipated his arrival, but also their destination's dress code.

"Sounds delightful," her lips briefly brushed against his cheek before she took his arm. "Shall we?"

_Delightful_, he mused, leading her back into the TARDIS's waiting doors, _is exactly what I had in mind_.

"Really, River, It's _nothing_," he attempted to explain, as he jogged through the lobby outside the theater, attempting to keep pace with an infuriated River Song. "Simple misunderstanding between friends – Marilyn never did know how to take a joke, surely you know that. And really, how was I to know she'd be here? As far as history is concerned, she died nearly four hundred years ago!"

"Funnily enough," she retorted, pushing through the glass doors and exiting to the street, "I've never read anything about Marilyn Monroe lacking a sense of humor. _Sweetie_. Oh, and everyone knows she didn't die in the 20th century. She was a _time agent_."

"You can't believe that I married her and planned some sort of assignation with her tonight, River. You simply can't," he took her arm, hoping to at least slow her down long enough to get her to look him in the eye again.

This was apparently the wrong move, however, because the next thing he knew he was flat on his back in the middle of the sidewalk outside the Luna Philharmonic, River's arm pinning him to the ground. Wordlessly she held one finger in front of her face as if to say that this was his final warning before she stood and stormed off again.

This time he didn't follow her.

Passers-by watched him curiously but cautiously as he stood, brushed street grime from his jacket and trousers, and tried to figure out just when the evening had gone so spectacularly wrong.

River had seemed distant from the moment they set foot in the TARDIS. The light kiss she had given him outside her cell had failed to evolve into anything approximating the greetings they typically exchanged during their evenings together (which had begun to occur quite regularly - in spite of what Amy thought, long days did not automatically equal short nights when one was in possession of a time machine), and while she had smiled and nodded and generally done her best to appear interested in their destination, there had been something in her eyes that troubled him.

It was almost as if she was grieving.

Needless to say, the slap he had received from one very affronted (and, from her perspective, jilted) Miss Monroe outside their box hadn't improved matters.

What he kept coming back to was the fact that normally River would have found the notion that he'd accidentally found himself engaged and possibly married to to an intergalactic sex symbol (an arrangement he considered null and void given that he had told her his name was Martin Amis and thus entered into the entire thing under false pretenses) hilarious. He was certain of it. River had never been the jealous type, and if they were going to play this game he had a few questions for her about exactly what kind of relationship he and she had from her perspective that even gave her the _right_ to be angry about his romantic interactions with other women.

For once, "spoilers" would not have been sufficient.

Nor would the fact that they had been kissing on a regular basis for linear months now.

He was tired of the hints, tired of the promises that he would know everything "soon," and tired of standing on this street corner, watching her walk away from him and having no real idea what was going through her head.

_Well she can just find her own way home_, half of his brain decided while the other half shouted _Chase her, you idiot!_ which resulted in his feet attempting to go in two directions at once before he tripped over both of them.

This really wasn't his night.

Just as he'd reconciled both voices to a cup of tea at a diner across the street (where he most certainly would _not _be waiting for River to change her mind and come back, but planned to station himself at a table next to the plate-glass windows just in case she did) he heard a scream coming from inside the concert hall.

A brilliant orange light briefly engulfed the building, and the lone scream turned into many as the auditorium doors were pushed open and terrified concert-goers began to flee the building. The Doctor looked up into the night sky expecting to see an alien ship or device creating the light, but found nothing. It appeared to originate within the structure itself.

Utterly failing to conceal his relief at having a tangible, tackle-able, and solveable task set before him, the Doctor plunged back into the building through the crowd of panicked men and women. He might not be able to figure out the whys and wherefores of River Song, but _this_ he could handle.

* * *

He creeped in a not altogether dignified way around the exterior doors of the auditorium. The havoc caused by the audience's flight had passed, and the place was now nearly silent. Nearly, in this case, meant that he could still overhear sporadic noises from behind the doors – most notably squeaks and squawks from musical instruments sounding as if people who had never touched them before in their lives were attempting to make music.

While he couldn't be certain without looking, the Doctor was fairly sure that the members of the orchestra were still inside. He hadn't seen any of the performers in the fleeing crowd, but from the sounds he heard they were either not in possession of their instruments or they were no longer in their right minds. Regardless, that left potentially a hundred likely innocent individuals inside (keeping in mind that they might be behind the whole thing) along with whatever had caused tonight's excitement.

His hearts pounded in excitement. Tonight was decidedly improving.

"Need a hand?" a quiet voice next to him murmured.

"River! What are you doing here?" he demanded, hoping that she hadn't seen just how high he had jumped when she'd whispered in his ear.

"You, me, date to the symphony? Ringing a bell?" her tone was sarcastic, but there was an undercurrent of genuine inquiry there too. For her, running into a past or future version of him was always a possibility.

"Yes, yes, of course. Same me from earlier. What I meant was, what are you doing _back_ here? You were fairly intent on getting as far away from me as possible a few minutes ago."

"Alien invasion, Doctor. Do try to keep up," she turned her attention to the auditorium doors. "You're not seriously planning to go through there, are you?"

"As a matter of fact, I-"

"Remind me to review the importance of the element of surprise with you next time," she said, giving him a patronizing pat on the hand before she stood. "I really can't take you anywhere anymore, can I?"

Infuriating (and largely rhetorical) questions aside, he couldn't deny the surge of relief he felt at seeing her back by his side. They would deal with the issue between them later, for now they would be working together. He wouldn't have it any other way.

"Have you locked the outer doors yet?" she asked, pointing at his sonic.

"No, why?"

"Because hundreds of people just saw whatever happened inside, and unless I'm very much mistaken local law enforcement will be here any moment. The last thing we want is for them to burst in here and get themselves killed."

The "or worse" implication was best left unsaid. The Doctor hurried down the staircase back to the front doors, which he promptly soniced shut.

"That isn't going to keep them out for long," he said softly but urgently, once again joining her outside the auditorium doors. "There must be a dozen entrances to this place."

"Two, actually, and I already got the performers' doors," she replied. "With luck, it'll be enough to buy us a few minutes."

"To do what, exactly?"

"Improvise." She grinned at him then – perhaps the first genuine smile he'd seen from her all evening.

_Someday_, the Doctor resolved, slowly advancing forward on his hands and knees and trying very hard not to think too hard about the fact that River was providing him with an extremely distracting view as she crawled in front of him, _I am going to find out exactly why she knows exactly where every trap door and hidden cupboard is in this place_.

The plan, insofar as there was a plan, was to make their way under the stage so they could covertly determine what they were dealing with. After securing the auditorium doors against the police (who were doubtless already attempting to make their way inside the building) River had unceremoniously shoved him into a small, dark closet, through which they had been able to access the crawlspace under the main stage.

As interludes in dark closets with River went, this one had been remarkably anticlimactic.

"Do you know where we're going?" he asked, realizing that the stage was quite large, and it was too dim for him to make out just where the lone trap door was located.

"Not much further," she whispered back at him as the discordant sounds of misused instruments above grew louder.

"Have you ever seen that orange light before?" he whispered back, fairly certain of the answer, but wanting to keep her talking.

"I don't think so."

"Ah. Me either."

"That much was pretty obvious, Doctor."

Silence descended again, and they crawled several more feet.

"Do you suppose the musicians are still up there?"

"I really don't care to speculate – and stop chattering. You're going to get us caught."

"Are you hearing what I'm hearing? Nothing with even moderately good ears could possibly tolerate that noise for this long. Well, unless they're Hexcoritihans: great ears, terrible taste in music. Really, makes one's hair stand on end to listen to it for longer than a few minutes. Though-"

She stopped and turned around, her nose almost bumping into his as she shifted her weight onto one hand in order to raise the other so she could point it in his face. "_Shut up_. I mean it, Doctor. I know your primary coping mechanism when you're confused, or bored, or trying to work something out is to babble, but _not now_."

He nodded, and they resumed their crawl.

Less than a minute later, just as he'd been about to open his mouth again to ask if she was really sure she knew where she was going, River stopped. The Doctor looked above their heads, and was pleased to see the trapdoor. Together, they pushed up just enough to open a small crack between it and the level of the stage. They peered out into the auditorium, utterly unprepared for what they were about to witness.

Dozens of musicians lay prostrate on the floor, twitching and grasping at empty air. Their eyes held the same bright orange light as the building itself had earlier. A handful more had managed to pull themselves into a sitting position, but seemed incapable of righting themselves further as they fruitlessly kicked their legs in an effort to find purchase against the glossy wood. Only a few were standing, and these appeared to be the ones who were attempting to operate the instruments. As the Doctor and River watched, the strongest looking of the bunch clumsily brought a euphonium to his lips, blew, and the horn began to glow orange as well. A moment later the man dropped the instrument to the ground, where it landed with a loud clang. He gasped for breath and stumbled, nearly falling on his own face in the process.

Without exchanging more than a glance, the Doctor and River slowly and gently pulled the trapdoor back down, careful not to make a sound as it settled back into place. The Doctor pointed at the far end of the crawlspace, underneath an area of the stage currently unoccupied by any of the clearly possessed musicians.

"What are they?" River asked him when they had reached their destination.

"No idea, but they're _fascinating_," he rubbed his hands together in anticipation. He loved this part. "They've clearly taken over the higher brain functions of the performers, but can't operate the bodies effectively. That would tend to indicate that their original form isn't corporeal – once you can operate one physical form, mastering another generally comes easily."

"You think they're gaseous," River nodded.

"Or plasma! Yes, plasma would be a possibility. Never met a plasma-based life form before!"

"Well, whatever they are, there's something about those instruments they need desperately. Do you think we ought to show ourselves?"

The Doctor considered for a moment. "I don't see any way around it. If we can communicate with them we can possibly help them get what they want before anything happens to them or to the musicians."

"You think they're still alive?"

"Yes – probably. Well, hopefully. Possibly." He scratched his cheek absently. "River, not to change the subject, but-"

She cut him off. "Not now."

"Right, of course. Bigger problems and all that."

He started crawling back to the trapdoor without waiting for her to follow. Bigger problems indeed.

"All right, here's the plan. I'll pop up there and see if I can't engage our glowing friends in conversation and you stay down here in case they decide to take over my body as well."

"What kind of a plan is that? That's a rubbish plan!" River shook her head firmly and pulled what he was beginning to think of as her evening-wear gun out of the bodice of her gown. "No, scratch that plan. We're going up there together, and I'll cover us while you do the talking. At the first sign of trouble I shoot and we run."

"No, no shooting! As far as we know the musicians are still alive. Let me talk to them first-"

"Compromise: we go up there together, I hold this and look threatening while you talk, and if there's trouble we just run for it."

He could tell it was the best he was going to get, so he nodded in agreement. This time when they pushed up against the trapdoor they didn't bother being quiet about it. As it fell aside and loudly banged on the floor, the Doctor lifted himself out of the crawlspace and turned back to offer River a hand. Naturally, she was already out and brushing dust from her skirt.

"I don't know that we needed to be so concerned about them hearing us earlier," she observed drily, and he realized that the possessed performers didn't appear to have taken note of their arrival.

"Indeed not," he agreed, stepping around those still on the floor and heading towards the small cluster of men who were still attempting to use their instruments. "Hello, I'm the Doctor."

He waited a beat, then another for them to answer or even acknowledge that he had spoken. Nothing.

"Is it possible that they can't see or hear us?" River asked, stepping alongside him after waving her hand in front of an adjacent clarinet player's face.

"I don't believe so," he said, deep in thought. "It's possible they don't realize we're trying to communicate with them, though." River shook her head, not understanding, and he continued. "If their original form is gaseous or plasma-based it would stand to reason that their senses aren't the same as ours. Think about it. If you were to suddenly become a cloud and were thrust into a bank of other clouds-"

"You might not understand what you were observing or how to interact with anything. Got it."

"But they do seem able to recognize the function of the instruments," he mused as one of them attempted to hoist a tuba to his lips.

The Doctor had turned to face River as he spoke, and was understandably shocked a hand belonging to the musician who had been attempting to play the euphonium earlier suddenly slapped itself on his shoulder.

"You…friend…us?" the man wheezed.

* * *

Shaking slightly, the Doctor lowered his hand from the musician's face. Communicating verbally had been a non-starter from the beginning as the man could hardly work out how to speak and keep his lungs going at the same time, but he absolutely hated using telepathy.

"What?" River asked. "What are they, and what do they want?"

"We were right, they're a plasma-based race. The orange light is energy they're using to maintain contact with these bodies."

"Are the musicians still alive in there?"

"Oh yes, and I was able to reassure the gentleman whose body that is – his name is Philip, by the way – that everything will be back to normal soon."

"So what do they want?" River stepped aside as a violin-player who had been slowly pushing himself to a sitting position suddenly collapsed to the floor again. "They're not getting any better at controlling their movements, and at some point they're going to hurt themselves."

The Doctor nodded. "They know. They're here because they needed sound waves."

"Sound waves?"

"Yes. Apparently it's part of a rather elaborate mourning ceremony that's only held once a millennium or so when a member of their royal family dies. They need a perfectly pitched 'C' in order to release her spirit into the afterlife." He pointed at the euphonium. "They used to be able to produce the sound themselves, but their world was destroyed and they lost the technology."

"So they came all the way to Earth's moon and possessed the bodies of an entire orchestra in order to make the right note?" River shook her head. "Unbelievable."

"Most truly profound gestures in the universe are, River."

"Do they have to produce the note themselves or can we do it for them?"

"They'd prefer not to have outsiders participate in the ceremony, that's why they didn't just take advantage of the original concert, but at this point they realize that they need to get out of these bodies as quickly as possible, so they'll accept our help." The Doctor gently plucked the euphonium out of Philip's hands. "Care to do the honors?"

"I'm sure you're more than capable, Sweetie."

His hearts skipped a beat as he realized it was the first time she'd called him anything other than "Doctor" all night. Perhaps whatever had gotten into her earlier had passed and they'd be able to enjoy one another's company once this excitement was over.

The Doctor positioned his fingers over the keys, pressed his lips to the mouthpiece, and blew. As the sound filled the hall, brilliant orange light blossomed from the euphonium and spread to every other instrument. He saw River's eyes light up with wonder for just a moment before the light faded and the room was enveloped in darkness.

* * *

Euphoniums, the Doctor reflected as he and River stepped out of the building and into a thankfully empty alleyway behind the concert hall, weren't exactly the easiest instruments to carry.

Philip had insisted that the Doctor keep the thing after he had regained consciousness. He'd looked too distressed at the evening's events to touch it again, so the Doctor had agreed to take it off his hands. _Just need a piccolo now and I'll be able to assemble a full marching band _he thought.

"I'll say this for tonight," River began, taking his hand in hers, "I've never attended a briefer concert. One note and done!"

They laughed together, and he appreciated how her earlier moodiness seemed to have disappeared. He was just about to put his free arm around her waist and suggest that they adjourn to the TARDIS when a long, black car pulled out at the end of the alley. The rear window rolled down, and he could see blonde curls inside. River stepped away from him and, in a quiet voice he almost didn't think belonged to her said, "Go."

"What do you mean, 'go?'"

"You and her – there's something there, Doctor, don't try to deny it. Go and talk to her."

"That _something_ was a clever lie I told someone I met at a party _one time_ when I barely knew you. It was to help a friend, who, incidentally, wound up saving Amy and Rory's lives thanks in part to what happened as a result of that lie. It was _nothing more_, though." He was well and properly irritated now and didn't mind if she knew it.

"Is that what you're about at this point? Hm? You say whatever you think we want to hear because it's convenient or serves some larger purpose?"

"River, how could you even think that?" he asked, offended on behalf of his future self. "I may not know everything - or anything -" in response to her cocked eyebrow, "about what we are or will be, but I do know that you're important. I've known that for quite a long time now, and that's _not_ a spoiler. I would never use you like that. You're..." he searched for the right word, something concrete. Something in his hand. "You're a euphonium."

"Beg pardon?"

"Yes, a euphonium. You're complicated, difficult at times to understand properly, but utterly necessary for the-." He stopped, suddenly realizing just how absurd his metaphor was about to become, but now that he was committed to it he could hardly back out without feeling even more foolish.

To her credit, River was biting back the laugh that was clearly on the verge of erupting. "You were about to compare your life to a symphony, weren't you? Go on."

"It's a _metaphor,_ River. We're speaking metaphorically so I can make a grand, sweeping point about the nature of the universe. Please pay attention." He cleared his throat and began again, "I meet a lot of people, you know that. And they're important, all of them are important in their own way. Marilyn-" he gestured toward the door, "was important. But she wasn't a euphonium."

"Let me guess, she was a sousaphone." River was grinning broadly.

"She was..." his mind raced, searching for an appropriate term, "a biplane. Marilyn was a biplane."

This time she did laugh.

He might have been trying to make her laugh.

"Biplanes, as you know, were quite important. Essential, even, when one considers the history of aviation. I was there, you know, when the Wrights took their first successful launch in a biplane."

"So you've said," she agreed.

"They couldn't have done it without me. But the thing about biplanes is that they became obsolete so quickly. They're still nice to look at and will unquestionably always have their place, but they ceased to be useful in the blink of an eye." He felt rather pleased with his analogy.

"So I'm a euphonium and Marilyn Monroe is a biplane?"

"Exactly! And people will always need euphoniums!"

This time River laughed deeply, throwing her head back. When she looked at him again, he could see a trace of the earlier sadness was back in her eyes, though. Suddenly, he felt very, very tired.

"Do you mind if we call it an early night?" he asked.

She nodded. "Go home, Doctor. I suddenly feel the need for a long chat with a very confused film star-slash-time agent."

He touched her hair gently, then enfolded her into a one-armed hug. "Thank you," she whispered into his coat sleeve. "Oh, and you might want to pop by Antwerp around February of 1894 sometime in the near future."

"Any particular reason?"

She smiled, and they said together, "Spoilers."

As he opened the TARDIS doors, the Doctor felt supremely smug. He really was getting the hang of this whole River Song business. He jogged up the stairs, euphonium still in hand, but when he got to the top he realized he'd not said a proper goodbye yet. Tonight definitely wasn't the night to forego such things. Hurrying back to the door, he leaned out and called out to her retreating form, "River, I'll see you in Antwerp! Tell Marilyn she's too late – she'll have to take the biplane! Take care!"

* * *

SOME TIME LATER

For the first time in recent memory, the Doctor checked the TARDIS's scanner for his exact temporal coordinates before stepping outside the doors. Half the fun came from never knowing exactly where and when he was until he was actually there, but in this case fun wasn't exactly his objective. If he botched the coordinates this whole trip would be for naught.

Stormcage Maximum Containment Facility, Cell 46. For her it had been one week since he'd sent Rory here dressed as a Roman soldier. It had also been two days since he'd arrived to pick her up for the symphony. The latter had been months ago for him, the former just yesterday.

Yes, he was exactly where he wanted to be.

Giving the old girl a pat by way of thanks, he straightened his bowtie, took a deep breath, and stepped out the doors. River's cell was directly in front of him, but the door was closed, and River was sitting cross-legged on her bunk, scribbling in her diary. He had left the brakes on this time, so she was plainly ignoring him. In fairness, he now knew just how much he deserved it.

"I didn't know," he said without preamble.

That got her attention. She looked up, puzzled, and closed the diary.

"The possessed orchestra - euphoniums and biplanes. I didn't know when that was for you."

The furrow between her eyes disappeared, and a sad, wry smile appeared on her lips. "Demon's Run hadn't happened for you yet," she said. "I knew that."

"That was the point, wasn't it?"

She sighed and rubbed her forehead as if she was battling a headache. "It's not that simple."

"It is, though. You hadn't ever seen a version of me who didn't understand who you are - that you're Melody Pond. It bothered you."

Tears welled in her eyes, and had she not been standing behind bars (bars either of them could open, but the fact that neither had made a move to do so spoke volumes) he would have embraced her. "It... it wasn't just that, Doctor. When are we for you?"

"I just left you to take your parents, Jenny, and Vastra home."

"Ah." She looked at the ceiling for a long moment, and when her eyes met his again they were clear. "There's still so much you still don't know that it's going to be difficult for me to explain much more than that what happened that night was really just the final straw. I saw you with her, and... I can't even explain it properly. I was frustrated and angry and resentful. I shouldn't have taken it out on you."

"For the record, I shouldn't have accidentally told Marilyn Monroe that I'd marry her." He was relieved to see a small smile twitch at the corners of her lips.

"I shouldn't have told her you had a thing for aquatic mammals," she teased, and his grin matched her own as the door to her cell swung open. Their lips met, and as his hand wound its way into her hair, the Doctor considered just how much he loved brass instruments.

* * *

The Stormcage guards never asked Dr. Song where she had gotten ahold of an antique concert-quality euphonium. They did, however, request that she please refrain from playing it while the other inmates were trying to sleep.


	3. The Tale of Jim the Fish

**A/N:** A word about the chronology of this series, particularly this specific chapter. As delightful as the "Night and the Doctor" mini-episodes are, either Steven Moffat has some very interesting ideas about just when certain events occurred that don't precisely line up with what we see between the Doctor and River in the series, OR he screwed up by name-dropping Amy and Rory in "First Night/Last Night." They simply cannot be on board if this episode takes place for the Doctor in one of the two places where I believe it most logically should have happened (immediately after either AGMGTW or TWORS).

After much back-and-forthing on the subject (including considerations involving Rule One) I've decided to take the Moffat-meant-what-he-wrote approach. All that said, the prologue to this chapter is set the same night as the epilogue to Chapter 2 (right after AGMGTW) and Chapter 3 proper occurs immediately after the events of "Let's Kill Hitler." As such, the Doctor hasn't done Area 52 yet, but this is the first time River has seen him since then.

Also, I have clearly expended far too much mental energy on this subject.

Finally, many thanks to everyone who has commented, favorited, and followed this series. It's been my first semi-ambitious project, and your encouragement has made it incredibly rewarding. Thank you!

* * *

**Chapter 2.5**

"You need to go," she murmured against his lips.

"I completely disagree," he answered, moving his mouth away from hers to trail kisses down her jaw and to the spot on her neck he'd recently discovered made her shiver anytime he touched it. His plans for the evening included spending a considerable amount of time becoming better acquainted with that spot.

Her hand drifted to the nape of his neck and she let out a soft sigh. He immediately decided it was his new favorite sound in the universe.

"No, really, you need to go," she said again, breathless but determined.

"Why," he asked, punctuating each word with a light kiss against her collarbone, "would I possibly want to do that?"

"Because you're supposed to be looking for me right now, Doctor, and if you stay," she removed her hand from his neck and took a step away from him, shaking her head to clear it, "you're not going to be able to keep from asking me questions."

The Doctor took a deep breath and briefly fisted his hands against the seams of his trousers. They were on the verge of staging revolt after being removed from River at an inopportune moment.

"I solemnly swear I will not attempt to cause a paradox or otherwise circumvent your timeline by asking about where the infant version of you is located," he said, holding up his right hand to attest to the truth of his statement.

"Nice try," she said with a smile, "but you forget how well I know you, my love. You have the impulse control of a very small, inquisitive ferret, and as soon as you get frustrated with your search you'll be back here trying to get me to tell you something – anything – about where I was. And so help me, if you keep doing that thing to my neck I might forget myself and tell you."

"Wait, so when you say I have to go –?"

"I mean you have to go and stay away until you've found me, yes."

He felt as if his eyes might truly fall out of his head. She couldn't possibly be serious.

"But River, that could take years! I mean, not that I think it will, obviously, because I don't plan to do anything except look for you between now and whenever it happens, but–"

"Which is exactly why you need to stay away from this me now," her voice was perfectly calm and controlled again, as if they hadn't just been on the verge of doing things to one another that (at least from his perspective) they'd never done before. Not that he was still thinking about those things, of course. "I'm a distraction, Doctor, and we both owe it to Amy and Rory to avoid distractions for the time being."

He opened his mouth to respond, realized her logic was based on friendship and loyalty and Doing the Right Thing, whereas his could be reduced to lust, and shut it again.

"You know I'm right, Doctor," she said gently, patting his arm reassuringly. "And I will tell you this – you won't be looking for me for years. Not even close."

"So I will find you?" he asked, hopefully.

She smiled again. "The answer to that seems pretty obvious all things considered, wouldn't you think?"

"Can I at least give you a proper goodbye, then?"

"I thought you'd never ask."

Oh yes, he was definitely still thinking about…things.

* * *

**Chapter 3: The Tale of Jim the Fish**

If the Doctor was being perfectly honest with himself (and he used Rule One in his own head almost as often as he did with other people) he would have acknowledged that he'd been slightly put out when River declined to wear the dress.

He'd almost forgotten about it, actually, but as he perused the Wardrobe in preparation for that evening, there it had been, tucked in between his tuxedo jackets. He remembered seeing a dripping River wearing it as she emerged from the swimming pool in 1969, and had idly thought at the time that the color was quite flattering on her. He'd never figured out where she had disappeared to in order to change that day (and the TARDIS still wasn't telling) but when he found the dress amongst his own clothing he took the hint.

This was a very young, River, though, and while he had just seen ample evidence suggesting that the essential parts of her wouldn't change over the coming years, apparently her taste in evening wear would.

Either that or she'd worn the dress back then as a joke to amuse them both later.

Regardless, whether she was wearing a ballgown or a prison uniform, she took his breath away. This was the first time he'd come for her since she'd warned him to stay away right after Demon's Run, and he was determined to make this evening their most memorable to date. Of course, from her perspective, he was fairly certain they hadn't had any evenings together at all yet, but from his they'd been dancing around in a grey area of oh-we're-accidentally-on-purpose-running-into-each-other-across-time-and-space-but-these-are-not-_dates_ for the better part of a year. That ended tonight.

"Remind me again why there's a 400 foot tree growing in the middle of the ocean on an industrialized planet?" she asked, peering up at the topmost branches as they waited for the lift to arrive from the sizeable beach at the base of the trunk.

"The people here started out as polytheistic tree worshippers back, oh, a thousand years ago or so, and this was a holy site. That religion was replaced by monotheistic one that cut out the bits on plant life 500 years ago, so now this place is more of a tourist attraction than anything else."

"It's beautiful," she breathed, touching the bark. "Don't tell me when it dies or is struck by lighting or chopped down for fuel during an ice age or anything. I want to imagine that it's always going to be here."

It was a statement of such breathtaking innocence that for a moment he couldn't speak. He'd seen River appreciate beautiful things before, and had heard her wax poetic about a number of different subjects, but there was something about the way she wanted to stay ignorant of the tree's fate simply because it was beautiful and old and sacred that struck him as incredibly…young.

It took his breath away as he realized that this was likely how he'd seemed to her back on the Byzantium. She hadn't even known what the diary was earlier, and it was her first night in Stormcage. He still didn't know why she was incarcerated there, and thankfully she hadn't said anything before he'd reminded her about their timelines, but he knew enough to tell that she was incredibly young. Possibly only a few years older than she'd been back in Berlin, even.

"Coming, Doctor?" she asked, and he realized the lift had arrived a full minute ago.

"Yes, of course, sorry, woolgathering." He took her hand as he stepped into the lift and resolved to stop thinking so much and start enjoying himself.

River apparently had the same idea, as she reached up her other hand to his cheek and turned his face to hers. "Really, Doctor, I can think of a number of more entertaining things you could be gathering at the moment."

Rather than elaborating on this comment, she simply pressed him against the lift doors and raised her mouth to his. The same thrill shot through him as had weeks ago when he'd kissed her much older version for the last time before blazing off in the TARDIS to find baby Melody. Now that he knew he hadn't – and wouldn't – find her, he understood why she had sent him away then. If he'd had an inkling of what she would have been in Berlin, well, they might not be standing here right now enjoying a truly excellent snog on a lift in a tree.

Just as she moved to deepen the kiss and make him forget all about one-time-only astronomical phenomena, the lift bell rang, and they came to a stop.

"Were those Sontarans over there?"

The Doctor pulled River back into the foliage, and hastily pointed up at…anything, really, to distract her. He had a feeling that said Sontarans really wouldn't buy that the River here now wasn't the same one they'd just been chasing for implying that they were on a hen night rather than a top secret raid.

For that matter, this River might not have much of a problem letting them think she was the same her they'd been after.

"What _is_ that?" she asked, following the sightline of his finger up into the upper branches of the tree, beyond the area where tourists were permitted.

Still distracted by the Sontarans (who appeared to be retreating, but you never could tell with them) the Doctor didn't realize initially what she was asking about.

"Hmm?"

"There, where you're pointing. What is that thing?"

His attention sufficiently pulled away from the definitely retreating Sontarans, the Doctor took a good look at exactly where his finger had guided River. It was…a thing.

"I have no idea."

It appeared to be a large sphere, clearly not arboreal in nature, hovering at least half a meter above the nearest branch.

"Come on – let's take a look!" She grabbed his arm and pulled him back towards the lift.

"But we only have three more minutes until-"

"We can always come back later for it, Doctor. Besides, if I could read a book by that light, we'll certainly be able to see exactly what that sphere is when the show starts."

He could hardly argue with her logic. Still, he'd been hoping for just one night where his plans wouldn't be interrupted by some variety of adventure that, while entertaining and potentially history-saving, would distract both of them from a single relaxing evening in the long course of their relationship.

He was ready to call it a relationship. That alone deserved some recognition from the universe. He had a feeling that the universe didn't agree. Again.

He'd forgotten how much he hated heights and narrow walkways until they were halfway across the increasingly slender (and clearly marked "For Maintenance Only") pathway that ran along the branch in question.

"You aren't phobic, are you, Sweetie?" she'd called back after he'd stopped and stared at the ground for the third time in as many minutes.

"I'd like to see you fall to your death once or twice and not develop a small aversion to high places," he responded tartly.

"So don't look down!" she called back merrily. She was clearly enjoying this far more than the prospect of unbelievably bright starlight. Why was he not surprised?

He willed himself not to check the distance between himself and the surface of the water again, and took a few more steps toward the still-mysterious sphere. It hadn't moved since they'd started approaching it, which meant that it was sleeping, incredibly stupid, deaf, or dead. He couldn't decide which he'd prefer.

He glanced at his wristwatch and called to River, "thirty seconds more until it starts!"

"Good, I'm nearly there," she called back, choosing not to slow down or otherwise wait for him.

Muttering under his breath about plans and times and places (but unable to ignore the rush of adrenaline that had begun to hit his bloodstream at the prospect of a new and mysterious alien-life-form-thing) he increased his pace. He'd be damned if he missed the look on River's face when she saw the stars begin to glow.

The ambient light level was already increasing when he got within three yards of River, who had stopped just underneath the sphere. Close up, he could see it was just the slightest bit translucent, and something inside of it was moving.

"I think it's an egg of some kind," she breathed, tilting and twisting her neck to see it better as the stars glowed above.

The Doctor aimed his sonic screwdriver at the sphere for a moment before checking the readings. "You're right, it is an egg. A fish egg. There's an enormous embryonic fish in there." He couldn't help it, he was grinning. The stars were beginning to shimmer with an incandescence unmatched by any sight in any place in any time in the universe, and all he could see was a giant fish egg.

He glanced at River. Her eyes were fixed on the egg too. Words couldn't describe how he felt about her in that moment, but he assured himself that he'd try to find some when he had a spare minute. For now, there was a giant fish egg floating above a tree branch nearly 400 feet in the air.

The stars could wait.

"Who would put a fish egg in a tree?" the Doctor asked (possibly rhetorically) as they each circled underneath it, trying to get a good view. Even in the brilliant starlight, it was hard to believe their eyes.

"Who would put a very large, fish egg in a tree hundreds of feet above a conveniently located body of water might be a more precise question," River pointed out, reaching up to poke the egg with the tip of her index finger. "It's being supported by an anti-grav unit attached to…" she looked around, "that branch up there. Clearly whoever put it here wanted to keep it safe."

"I'm not sure I'd call three hundred feet in the air in a _tree_ safe for a fish, Dear, but if you mean that someone put some thought into its location, then yes, it's safe. What it is not, however, is native to this planet. The protein strands are all wrong."

"Which begs the question, how are we going to get it down from here?"

The Doctor gave River an incredulous look. "Who said anything about getting it down?"

"It's a fish, Sweetie, not native to this planet, several hundred feet in the air, in a _tree_. The better question is why wouldn't we get it down?"

"It's over a meter in diameter – there's no way you could possibly hold it, walk, and not fall off this limb at the same time." He shook his head. "No, I have a better plan. We're going to need a very large tub and several hundred gallons of water."

Before River could answer, the anti-grav unit that had been supporting the egg exploded in a shower of sparks and hot metal. The Doctor, who had been standing directly under the egg when it happened, just managed to grab hold of it, nearly losing his balance in the process and tumbling over the side of the limb.

"Get down!" River shouted at him, drawing her gun and dropping to one knee as she rapidly turned her head, trying to determine where the shot had come from.

"Where exactly is 'down' other than the obvious?" the Doctor retorted. "In case you hadn't noticed, holding a giant fish egg while standing on a very narrow tree branch over here!" He could hardly see a thing with the egg blocking most of his view, and he didn't dare set it down. As it was, he suspected the pressure of his hands and chest against it was causing damage.

"Just crouch!" River directed, firing several shots at a limb below. A cluster of leaves just above her head exploded, and she fired again. "We're sitting ducks up here – when I say run, RUN."

The Doctor tightened his grip on the egg, praying that it was sturdier than it felt.

"Where exactly are we running to?" he shouted as River exchanged another volley of shots with their unseen attacker. "This egg isn't going to survive a rough ride."

"Back to the TARDIS!" A bolt of energy struck just inches from the Doctor's shoes, and he didn't wait for her cue to start running.

"How is that going to help?" he called over his shoulder.

"Don't you have a swimming pool?"

* * *

"Why do we always end up with fish?" he asked crossly as they anxiously waited for the lift to deposit them back at beach level.

"I think that's spoilers, Doctor," River chided. "Or weren't you serious earlier about the diary?"

"Drat. Well, there you go. We always end up with fish. The story of your life: adventures with me and fish."

Before she could respond, the lift doors opened and River drew her gun again, holding her hand out at him as a warning to let her go first. Under the circumstances, he wasn't about to protest. As expected, more shots exploded around her the moment she stuck her head out the door. Also as expected, she was too clever for them by half.

"Close your eyes, Sweetie!" she called, and the tone in her voice was unmistakably delighted. He obliged, and the next thing he knew he was shielding his closed eyes from a brilliant light he assumed she had somehow produced. Given the fact that it was already close to daylight outside, he hoped she had shielded her own eyes as well. Whatever it was would most likely have caused retinal scarring for anyone who hadn't taken precautions.

"Were you expecting something like this?" he asked, deciding it was likely safe to open his eyes again when she began tugging on the crook of his arm. "Because I'm fairly certain whatever that was wasn't standard Stormcage issue."

"I'm always expecting 'something like this' when I see you, Doctor," she replied. "Now come on!"

* * *

By the time they reached the TARDIS the starlight had all but faded. The Doctor tried not to feel disappointed that they hadn't had time to appreciate it more. He did, however, take a moment to thank the TARDIS for replacing the swimming pool just in time for its new inhabitant.

For his part, Jim seemed to be enjoying himself. Or, the Doctor supposed he would be, once he finished hatching. The process, as it turned out, took a bit of time.

The lights just under the surface of the water rippling blue and gold reflections over River's face as she sat on the ledge above the deep end, her bare feet dangling in the water. She watched Jim's progress, utterly transfixed. The Doctor didn't think he'd ever seen that particular look on her face before – as if she was blocking out the rest of the universe just to focus on one tiny miracle.

He liked that face.

Fully submerged under the water, Jim's struggle to extricate himself from the egg's carapace was silent, so the only sound in the room was the gentle lapping of water against the tile. Part of him wanted nothing more than to go to River and find out what she was thinking, but an equally strong part couldn't bear to break this beautiful silence.

"Did the TARDIS know where he's from?" she asked quietly, spying him watching her from across the pool.

"Hmm? Oh, yes. He's called a D'Nak. Actually from a little planet a few solar systems away. No idea how he got into a tree on Alderin Beta, though." He walked around the edge of the pool and came to a stop next to her, though he didn't sit down yet. "I imagine that bit may become clearer when we reach his planet."

"Taking the scenic route, are we?" she asked with a smile.

"Well he does have to hatch first," the Doctor pointed out, settling down on his heels to avoid getting wet as they watched the fish together.

"Honestly, you'd think you didn't have a dozen pairs of those same trousers the way you're acting," said River, pulling him down to properly sit next to her.

The Doctor felt dampness seep through the fabric, but didn't protest. Instead, he snaked his arm around her waist and settled his hand on her thigh. She sighed happily and wordlessly relaxed into his embrace. He remembered sitting just like this a few months before as they watched a supernova from the TARDIS doors, and wondered if she'd recalled this moment back then.

They were silent for a moment before River spoke up again. "I think we should name him."

"You think we should what?"

"Name the fish. People do that, don't they?"

He couldn't even think of a response. Since when did River Song go around naming anything, much less a fish? It was absurd. It was completely off-point. Completely not what they should be expending mental energy thinking about when they had much greater concerns at their feet. It was...completely something River Song would do. Of course. He was just about to acquiesce when she continued.

"I think we should call him Jim."

"Jim the Fish?" a bell rang in the back of his brain. He knew this one.

"Yes, Jim the Fish."

* * *

An hour later, Jim had finished hatching. He was most certainly a fish, and the Doctor had definitively verified his planet of origin before setting a course.

"So how exactly were you planning to get him out of the swimming pool?" River asked, sidling up next to him as he finished entering the coordinates.

"Simple. We'll just open the doors and let Jim swim home." He flipped the last switch and then turned to face her, running one hand down the length of her arm as he did so.

"And those doors would be located…?"

"Did I forget the part about materializing the TARDIS inside the lake?" He grinned.

* * *

"See, what did I tell you? Perfect spot for Jim – above and below!" the Doctor stepped out of the TARDIS doors, gesturing emphatically for River's benefit. Really, he was quite impressed with himself. Perfect dropoff underwater (well, except for the part when the doors to the pool jammed and she'd gotten soaked trying to get them to close again), perfect sunny and deserted beach for a perfect…

"That's far enough, offworlder," came a threatening voice from behind the decidedly not-perfect gun that was now only centimeters from the Doctor's nose.

"Ah, well, if I may make a brief suggestion," the Doctor said, taking a step back and hoping that River wasn't taking her time drying her hair, "that may not be the best idea."

"No, it really isn't," came River's voice from behind him. He assumed she was aiming her own gun at his would-be attacker.

Suddenly six more guns were pointed at both of them, one from each of the six men standing behind the one who had initially accosted the Doctor. As much confidence as he had in River's abilities, this didn't seem like a winning proposition.

"All right, all right, we give up. River! We give up!" he called back to her, hoping that for once she would just follow his lead without argument.

Not hearing a response, he decided to press on and hope she wasn't about to do anything rash. "I'm sorry, we seem to have gotten off on the wrong foot. I'm the Doctor, this is River, and we were just looking for a nice spot to picnic. I take it this is not that spot?"

The lead gun-pointer narrowed his eyes at the Doctor, clearly assessing the believability of this claim. "No, it is not. This is the ancestral home of the D'Nak, and not a site for offworlders."

"Ah, the D'Nak! Lovely species, very large. Very _aquatic_," he hoped River got the hint.

"Do not play games with us, offworlder," another of the men spoke up. "We know that…box of yours was on the lake floor only moments ago. Or did you think our simple planet lacked surveillance equipment?"

"Oh no, never," the Doctor assured them. "Isn't that right, River? We'd never assume any such thing."

"Quite," she agreed, stepping forward to join him on the beach. He was relieved to see that her gun was out of sight, though he assumed she had several more stashed in easily reached pockets.

"Actually, funny story, really, you see we were just on Alderin Beta and happened to run across a D'Nak egg suspended in a tree. Really, it was quite bizarre. What you saw – that was us returning the hatchling to its native waters, nothing more."

This seemed to throw the group off-balance for a moment, and the leader took a step back to quietly confer with his compatriots while also keeping an eye (and his weapon) on the Doctor and River.

"I think we've discovered why the egg was hidden in that tree," River murmured, low enough not to be heard by anyone but the Doctor.

"Correction, I think we've discovered that the egg _was_ hidden, but not why. It makes no sense – the D'Nak is a locally protected species, but wouldn't be particularly valuable to anyone on Alderin Beta." He shook his head in frustration.

"Why is it locally protected?"

"Well, according to the TARDIS's records, the D'Nak build enormous dams to house their eggs during mating season. Around here, those dams help to regulate the water supply, and the D'Nak are moved from lake to lake according to the dam-building needs of the area. They're enormously important, but only to a planet like this one with very specific water-regulation needs. Alderin Beta doesn't have any of those."

"Quite peculiar, I agree," River said before the group turned back to face them.

"What you say has the ring of truth," the leader began. "Twelve days ago, a D'Nak egg was stolen from this lake by a group of offworlders. Their vessel did not look like yours, but we suspected they were from the Alderin System." He shook his head. "We sent out a retrieval team to investigate, but they were unable to locate the egg in any of the planet's water sources."

"Ah, yes, well that would likely be why the people who stole it hid it in a tree. Who'd think to look for a fish egg there?" the Doctor smiled. "Well, we're very happy to have repatriated your D'Nak. Now, if you don't mind, we'll just be off-" He took a step back toward the TARDIS, hoping against hope that they'd be allowed to simply leave.

"Wait! What assurance do we have that the ones who stole the D'Nak will not simply return? You must have more information on their identity!" this from one of the men in the back who had a particularly desperate look in his eye.

"You don't," River spoke up, laying her hand on the Doctor's in a silent request to let her handle this part. "What you do have is our promise that we will go back to Alderin Beta once you let us leave and do our best to find the person or persons responsible."

The group considered this for a moment. "Very well," said the leader. "Will you return once you have found them?"

"You have my word," said the Doctor.

"And mine," River echoed.

* * *

"I take it that this isn't quite the evening you had planned, Sweetie?" River asked, as they crept back to the base of the tree.

"Oh you know me," he whispered, trying to keep as close to the ground as possible. "Dinner, dancing, repatriating newborn fish, facilitating justice."

"You certainly do know how to spoil a girl," she turned around and winked at him, and in spite of himself the Doctor flushed. Once this was over… "Now, you're sure you landed us just a few seconds after the TARDIS left?"

"Certain. I even checked the environmentals," she gave him an odd look, and he hastily muttered, "Spoilers."

"Then they shouldn't be hard to locate. Look," she pointed up at the sky. "The last of the starlight hasn't faded yet." He resisted the urge to draw his arm around her waist to enjoy the last moments of spectacular beauty together. If she was right about the effects of the light bomb she had activated in order to facilitate their escape earlier then they only had a few more minutes before their attackers would be able to see well enough to escape themselves.

"River, over there," he pointed at a large dark shape moving slowly across the ground just a few meters from the lift doors.

"I see it," she said, and began to run without waiting to see if he was following. He hurried along behind, resisting the urge to ask her to slow down for him. River could more than take care of herself, and to be honest this part of the adventure was typically more her area of expertise than his.

Sure enough, by the time he reached her, she'd hauled the (rather large, rather male) figure to his knees, and had her gun trained to his temple.

"Care to tell me why you were just shooting at us?" she asked in a far less aggressive voice than her actions would have warranted.

"You were stealing my egg!" he shouted, rubbing at his eyes and blinking rapidly in an effort to clear his vision.

"I think you'll find that the original owners of that egg would object to your use of a possessive pronoun," the Doctor noted.

River snickered, and the man attempted to rise to his feet. The muzzle of River's gun dug a bit more forcefully into his temple, and he relaxed again. "And who are you to say that I'm not the original owner?"

"Hmm, let's see: an egg that doesn't belong in this solar system, much less this planet; up in a tree; and you shot at us with little regard for its well-being when we were inspecting it. Did I miss anything, Sweetie?" she turned to him expectantly.

"Don't forget the bit where the original owners asked us to bring the thief back to their planet to stand trial," he piped up.

"Right you are," she said. "Any questions, or shall we just get you into the handcuffs I'm sure my friend has somewhere in his pockets," she looked at him flirtatiously. "Or in mine. You're welcome to check, Doctor."

He grinned, and almost forgot that they were in the middle of a situation that wasn't precisely conducive to extended bouts of flirting. "Aren't you always the one carrying handcuffs, Dr. Song?"

She laughed, "Now I _know_ that's spoilers," and gestured towards her left hip pocket. "Look in there." He did, and felt a rush of anticipation as she shivered when his hand pressed against her thigh through the thin cotton lining of her pocket.

"Right, handcuffs," she said, taking them from him and snapping them around the wrists of the thwarted thief.

"Quickly now, back to the TARDIS for dropoff," the Doctor said, taking one of the man's elbows in his hand and leading them determinedly back to the ship.

"Wait, you haven't asked me what I was doing with the egg!" the man protested.

"You know, for once I find I really don't care," the Doctor responded, catching River's eye and giving her a wink of his own. Yes, they really needed to wrap this up quickly.

"Tell it to the people you stole it from," she agreed, opening the TARDIS door and shoving him inside, taking the opportunity to press her free hand against the small of the Doctor's back, more to caress than to urge him inside.

"I think you'll find we're on too tight a schedule to stick around for the explanations," the Doctor agreed. He didn't even pretend to protest when River not-so-gently sat their former assailant down in the jumpseat and began setting a course.

* * *

The dropoff had gone, for once, completely without incident. The TARDIS had materialized on the beach only moments (from the perspective of the group standing there) after it had initially departed, the egg thief had been unceremoniously thrown out the double doors, and with a jaunty wave goodbye the Doctor and River had left again. He supposed he should have felt some sense of obligation to ensure that the man received a fair trial, but according to the TARDIS database they did have a reputable justice system that would treat him fairly. And also, really, under the circumstances he couldn't see any reason why the universe didn't owe him a bit of a favor. After all, it had been a very long year.

"Penny for your thoughts," River murmured, sliding her arms around his waist as he fiddled with the console.

"Just thinking about how nice it is to be done with all the running," he replied. "Where did you disappear to?"

"The Wardrobe," she said, and he turned around to see the results. She was wearing a simple blue dress that felt marvelously swishy against his hand. "Are you ready to go back, or will we be spending the rest of this evening 'in'?"

He smiled, remembering what both versions of her older self had implied about this night only hours earlier. "Oh no, we're heading back. I need to give you some memories to feel nostalgic about in the future."

He could tell River was on the verge of asking him to explain, but decided to let the mystery remain.

Taking her hand in his, he pressed the final controls to take them back to Alderin Beta, and trusted that the TARDIS would oblige him this once by letting him cross his own timeline for the third time that evening so he could properly show River the stars.

This time around, the Doctor and River had waited until the starlight had already begun to brighten before they attempted the lift. They directed it to the highest level – with the aid of the sonic screwdriver, as it wasn't permitted to tourists – to avoid any possible interactions with the versions of themselves currently cavorting around the lower branches. They had watched with some interest as earlier-in-the-evening River had spotted the Sontarans, and earlier-in-the-evening Doctor had inadvertently distracted her with the sight of Jim's egg.

As the starlight began to glow brighter and brighter around them, though, he found he had no interest in continuing to watch their slightly younger selves chase after a mysterious sphere and an equally mysterious stranger. Tonight wasn't about where they had been, but rather where they were going.

Next to him, River breathed in sharply, and he knew she had stopped watching the rerun below as well. The very air around them had begun to hum with light, and shimmers of brighter and brighter stars began to flare in the sky above and around them. In spite of their brilliance, the Doctor only saw the spectacle from the corner of his eye – his attention was utterly fixated on River as she watched the sky above and around them. Her face echoed awe, and wonder, and the feeling of being at the center of something precious and finite that had to be savored before it was gone forever. Her hair caught the starlight, and for a moment it looked like a halo of light was encircling her face.

"River," he whispered, not wanting to break the magical silence, but feeling an irresistible compulsion to tell her something very important.

"Shhh," she urged, not wanting to tear her attention away from the stars.

"No, it can't wait – if it does, I might not be able to say this again."

That caught her attention.

"River, this is very important. Someday – not soon for you, but someday – I won't remember this. I won't have been here, or anywhere we go after this for me. I won't _know you_, and I won't have made the choice I'm making right now." He pressed his forehead to hers, wanting to be as close to her as possible, but needing to explain himself. "I want you to know, I am _choosing_ this life with you. I know I have a choice, and there will be times I'll be tempted to make a different one, but –"

She cut him off with her mouth. For a moment he was tempted to continue speaking, because there were still so many things left unsaid. Words like _love_ and _forever_ that he knew he'd never told her before and might not have the will to say out loud again for a very long time. Words that would help to cushion her heart in the years to come when he would be so very young and ignorant and unnecessarily cruel.

Then she opened her mouth against his, and he felt the press of her tongue on his own. She moved her hand under his jacket to pull him closer, and he found he couldn't do anything but _feel_. His hands threaded through her hair, and he sensed rather than saw the stars explode in light around them as all the worries and responsibilities and complications of their relationship faded to nothingness against the brightness of the moment.

* * *

**EPILOGUE**

"Her days will be in Stormcage, but her nights…well, that's between her and me."

The Doctor turned away from Dorium, and smugly shut the TARDIS doors behind him, reveling in the release of a weight he hadn't even realized he'd been carrying. The universe believed that the Doctor was dead – and he was free.

"You know, Sweetie, hearing you just then might make a girl think that you only come to visit me out of a sense of obligation." River, unsurprisingly, had been listening to his conversation from just inside the TARDIS as he'd made his exit from the catacombs.

The Doctor shook his head and wagged his finger at her. "And what have I told you about eavesdropping?"

"Nothing yet, which means you'll probably mention something about it soon enough. So tell me, Doctor, is that why you keep popping up outside my cell on a nightly basis?" She was teasing him, but there was an undercurrent of genuine curiosity in her tone.

"Do you remember what I said to you on Alderin Beta? It was awhile ago for you, I know."

River cocked an eyebrow. "Making insinuations about my age now, are you? My, you're not going to have any fun this evening at the rate you're going." The smile on her face lent a teasing air to her words, but he could tell she was not going to allow him to sidestep the original question.

"Of course not, dear, I just meant that it was awhile back, so you might not remember what I said."

"Time Lord memory, Sweetie. I remember that night as well as you do."

"Ah, yes, forgot about that bit. See, even a Time Lord memory isn't all it's cracked up to be all the time."

"Or you're just getting old."

"Yes, quite. Well, do you remember or not?"

"Let's see, there was a dress I refused to wear, I heard voices coming from the Console Room – wait…was that me? Did I actually show up there twice without realizing it?"

"_Now_ you realize it was the same night!"

"With the way you pick up strays, Doctor, it's hardly surprising I thought you were talking to someone else."

"Twice?"

"Again, no fun for you tonight."

"Right, right. So what else do you remember?"

"The tree, the Sontarans,– it _was_ the same night! – Jim the Fish, starlight, and then you went off on a long digression about how you'd made a choice and that you hoped I'd remember that in the future when you didn't know me as well as you did at that moment."

"Yes, River. A choice. Do you know when that was for me?"

She shook her head. "You hadn't done Area 52 yet, obviously, but – oh."

"I've made that choice again and again, River. I'm making it as I speak. I didn't always want this life with you, and at times I may have led you to believe that I didn't want it, but if I have learned nothing else in my exceptionally long life I have learned that a choice not made is generally a choice regretted. I choose."

"And so do I," she breathed.

Yes, the nights were theirs. Every night. For as long as they had.


End file.
